After World War I, commercial passenger aviation became available to those who could afford it. Early airlines strove to provide comfort to their distinguished (and few) guests; most airplanes seated between four and 15 people. The first in-flight meal service was initiated in 1919, when boxed lunches costing three British shillings were offered on a Handley-Page flight from London to Paris.

In 1929, the French aviation company, Air Union, redesigned its aircraft cabins to include dining tables. The way passengers ate, facing each other across a table, suggests early aviation designers relied on precedents, such as restaurants, railway dining cars, and cruise-ship or Zeppelin dining rooms.

Early in-flight food service was limited by the aircraft’s weight restrictions. Freshly-cooked dishes were kept warm in covered, wicker baskets. More often, however, food was served cold. Meals were eaten on light-weight, bone-china plates. Because flying was unattainable to most and passengers were few, menus rarely changed; it was unlikely a passenger would fly often enough to get the same meal twice!

The first recorded in-flight, full-meal service was served by the crew of a French Air Union flight on July 30, 1927. The menu featured hors d’oeuvres, lobster salad, cold chicken and ham, niçoise salad, ice cream, and cheese with fruit. Selective beverages included champagne, wine, whiskey, mineral water, and coffee. This level of service lasted only two years before it was discontinued as impractical.

1914    Zeppelin airships provide meals and beverage services to its passengers.

1919    Pre-packed airline meals first appear on a commercial flight on October 11, when a KLM flight between London and Paris offers boxed lunches for sale.

1927    Crew on an Air Union flight serve the first recorded, full-service, in-flight meal consisting of seven courses, all served cold.

1928    The first hot meal prepared and served on an airplane is made by Lufthansa crew on April 29 en route from Berlin to Paris. The B-31 aircraft could accommodate 15 passengers and was equipped with a full galley kitchen.

When American Airways released its 21-minute promotional film, Fly American!, in 1933, aircraft were still too small to take on significant weight. Therefore, the food served on passenger flights was limited to beverages and light fare, such as ham sandwiches with an apple or a banana. The American Airways film highlights a stewardess walking down the narrow aisle of a twin-engine Curtiss Condor airplane while the narrator declares,

  A tasty lunch on a personal tray.

  Is it  any wonder American Airways

  planes  have become famous for

  delicious food? This is travel deluxe!

While the language of airline marketing materials strove for luxury, technological limitations curtailed complete comfort. Because visual navigation systems were primitive, most commercial flights flew at a low altitude. This resulted in an increased chance of turbulence, which made serving food mid-air precarious. In adverse weather conditions, a pilot might land the aircraft mid-flight and the crew would conduct its food service on the ground. It was not uncommon for airline crews to serve customers lunch in an airline hangar or on picnic tables during a scheduled stop (i.e., while the airplane was refueling).

In-flight catering began to evolve from pre-packaged, cold sandwiches in the 1930s, during the dawn of luxury air travel. By the mid-1930s, airplanes were built with kitchens and had enough engine power to reheat food in convection ovens. For instance, the Pan American Airway’s Martin M-130 “Clipper,” designed in 1935, was equipped with ovens that could roast meat while in flight and included a separate dining area with tables draped in white cloths and a buffet. In-flight meals at the time may have included warmed fried chicken or roast beef dinners followed by free cigarettes.

1933  Alice and Bill Marriott provide food to waiting passengers through their “Hot Shoppes.”

1934  The Australian airline, Qantas, and the British airline, Imperial, offer long-haul journeys across continents in “hops.” Hot food is prepared beforehand, packed in large, insulated containers, and served without being reheated.

1935  The Baltimore, Maryland-based Glen L. Martin Company designs the Martin M-130 “Clipper” for Pan American Airways. Three are built. They feature ovens for cooking food mid-flight and separate dining areas.

1937  United Airlines food consultant Donald F. Magarrell establishes the airline industry’s first flight kitchen in Oakland, California.

1938  United Airlines adds the first on-board, galley kitchens to their DC-3 aircraft, which had countertop prep spaces and thermoses to keep coffee and tea warm.

1939  The Boeing 307 Stratoliner is the first aircraft with a pressurized cabin, allowing it to fly above the weather, resulting in greater flight stability.

As aircraft technology improved through the 1940s, serving in-flight meals became an attraction to draw passengers to a particular airline. Creating comfortable environs and retaining a friendly cabin crew that served delicious in-flight meals were strategies to increase passenger pleasure and to compete with several independent airline companies. For longer flights, serving meals was seen as a means of mitigating the boredom of sitting in one place for hours.

Interior aircraft design began incorporating catering functions in this decade. The Boeing 377 served passengers in staterooms with a separate dining area below deck.

Despite the growing sizes of airplanes through the decades, meals were by and large made off-site and transferred to the airplane before departure. By the 1940s, municipal airports included large kitchen facilities where staff prepared and packaged meals to be served to passengers on commercial flights. In 1946, the first independent airline kitchen was established at the Atlanta airport for Delta Airlines.

Frozen meals began to appear on airplanes after World War II. Frozen food technology was developed by the United States military during the war and later was adopted by private carriers (such as Qantas Airline, which introduced frozen tray meals to Australia in this decade). Military leaders noticed that troops in transit to Europe were not receiving enough to eat during the long flights. Frozen meals were sealed in an aluminum, compartmentalized tray that could be reheated. On flights, these were stored on wheeled carts that were powered electrically to keep the frozen trays cold.

International flights in the 1950s were expensive, and menus increasingly reflected the opulence of this glamorous mode of travel. Cocktail service coupled with elaborate French meals or thematic cuisines based on flight destinations characterized in-flight catering in First Class. Larger airplanes featured galley kitchens where meals were cooked in “five-minute ovens” then served on tablecloth-draped dining trays bedecked with silver cutlery and bone-china plates. Many airlines capitalized on the exoticism of international travel through their menus and through special interior designs.  At the same time, domestic flights would highlight the regional cuisines of their home bases, so that American Airways, based in Texas, might serve chicken potpies with biscuits while Southern Airlines, based in Louisiana, served creole shrimp salad with remoulade.

By the time the Boeing 707 became operational in 1957, American in-flight caterers had established “custom-built” facilities at airports (typically in the airline’s hub city) in order to streamline production for the larger jetliners that held increased passenger capacity. Still, quality was not sacrificed for quantity, and even Coach passengers could expect a steak dinner with fresh vegetables.

1954  The first usable microwave oven, Raytheon’s Model 1611 Radarange, is installed on an aircraft. It weighs 750 pounds and is six feet in height.

1958  Pan American Airways uses television commercials to tout its “five-minute ovens,” or toaster ovens that could reheat pre-made meals in 300 seconds. This ushers in the era of eating piping-hot meals in air.

1959  The ‘Sandwich Wars’ are waged between Pan American Airways and Scandinavian Airlines System (SAS). Airlines had agreed that Coach (or Economy Class) passengers would receive sandwiches as food service on international flights. SAS provided a buffet of delicious, open-faced sandwiches on a higher-quality bread than other airlines used, angering its competitors. Pan American Airways complained to the International Air Transport Association (IATA), which levied fines on SAS. The IATA defines a cold sandwich moving forward.

In the 1960s, the increased number of large, jet-propelled aircraft resulted in shorter flight durations, which, in turn, discouraged the elaborate food services that had been used as a means of distraction on longer flights. At the same time, larger and more stable aircraft allowed for the design of more complex food preparation facilities. Appliances allowed cabin crew to quickly and efficiently prepare in-flight meals on shorter flights.

In the spirit of streamlining, airlines adopted disposable service items, such as plastic cutlery and glassware, that did not need to be washed and stored. With the practical limitations of plastic cutlery, meals were chosen that could be eaten simply. 

During this decade, aircraft designers began to maximize passenger capacity by introducing more and smaller seats to the cabin while narrowing aisles. Flight attendants required an efficient way to serve food and beverages while in flight, so the first iterations of the insulated trolley cart appeared. These wheeled carts allowed flight attendants to push narrow trays of hot foods and drinks down the narrowing aisles while maintaining food temperature. Over the years, trolleys were fitted with internal cooling and heating systems, interlocking compartments, and locking wheels.

1962  Gladieux Corporation constructed an in-flight kitchen at Washington Dulles International Airport.

1963  Marriott/Hot Shoppes in-flight kitchen constructed at Washington Dulles International Airport.

1968  Gladieux and Ogden Corporations merged. It continued to serve Washington Dulles International Airport and expanded the kitchen facility, adding a loading bay to the west side of the facility and fitting the kitchen with new equipment.

1969  On March 2nd, the Concorde supersonic transport service, initiated by British Airlines, arrived at Washington Dulles International Airport. This ushers in a new era of luxury service and high-quality cuisine. Menus for the Concorde’s elite clientele featured champagne, foie gras, caviar, and lobster.

By the 1970s, flying became an increasingly democratic experience. The invention of the larger Boeing 747 and deregulation of the airline industry that had required comparative ticket prices for each route both fostered decreases in airline ticket fares, allowing middle-income passengers to choose flying as their primary mode of transportation. This also resulted in the gradual reduction of in-flight amenities, however, including meals.

This period also witnessed a hardening of the distinction between First and Economy (or Coach) classes. A meal in First Class might take as many as two hours to serve while an entire cabin of Economy Class passengers could be served in 30 minutes. In 1971, Southwest Airlines began the tradition of serving packs of peanuts to its customers as a mid-flight snack.

At the start of the decade, the French airline Union de Transports Aeriens (UTA, what would later become Air France) questioned the quality of its catered in-flight meals. Since 1939, when United Air’s food consultant conducted a study and presented his findings at the St. Regis Hotel in New York, executives in the airline industry were aware that in-flight conditions (i.e., altitude, low humidity, and pressurization) desensitized human taste buds and therefore affected the flavors of the food served. Later research confirmed that background noises also affected the perception of flavor.

In 1973, UTA recruited celebrity chef Raymond Oliver to re-evaluate its menu. Oliver reformulated UTA’s offerings and increased their recipes’ salt, sugar, cream, and fat contents. This improvement was noted by other airline caterers, who began to favor richer and saltier dishes. In addition, meats with sauces were well suited to reheating mid-air. This finding also resulted in an increased focus on a meal’s visual appeal and presentation.

While First Class service continued to offer high-quality food and beverage options through the 1980s, two events mid-decade resulted in a pivot towards economizing. In 1985, Ryanair was founded as a low-budget airline, and it quickly grew to become the seventh largest airline company. Its strategy to lower airfare for passengers, for which it was criticized by competitors, was to focus on lowering the cost of its food and beverage offerings.

In 1987, American Airlines chef Robert Crandall made the decision to eliminate a single olive from each salad served in First Class. This saved the company $40,000 annually. The act prompted airlines to look for other ways to cut costs.

The economization of air travel continued in the 1990s through today. A website (airlinemeals.net) was created in 2001 that provided a public forum for the public to discuss the quality of airline food and post photographs, further democratizing the passenger flight experience.

After the attacks on September 11, 2001, the  TSA increased in-flight security measures, which included the exclusive use of plastic cutlery. Because of economic instability in the airline industry following the terrorist attacks, several airlines further decreased their in-flight food and beverage services after 2002. In 2006, a thwarted plot to attack several aircraft in flight with liquid explosives resulted in further restrictions by the TSA that barred passengers from bringing their own beverages onto airplanes and into terminals past the security checkpoints.

Full meals are still prepared and served during long flights, and certain airlines are known for their quality offerings. Today, the Emirates has the world’s largest catering facility in Dubai. The Emirates Flight Catering kitchen produces an average 225,000 meals per day and over 82 million meals in a year.

2000  Washington Dulles International Airport’s in-flight kitchen is occupied by LSG Sky Chefs, one of the largest in-flight catering companies in the world.

2002  The IAD Gladieux Building is vacated and LSG Sky Chefs occupies the Marriott/Hot Shoppes In-Flight 

  Kitchen.

2003  The Concorde makes its last flight. Its final in-flight menu included truffles, foie gras, and lobster.

2009  British Airways eliminates meal service on short-haul flights in order to reduce operating costs. This blurs the line between traditional full-service, legacy airlines and no-frill, economy carriers for the first time.

2009  The invention of sous vide, or submerging vacuum-sealed food in a temperature-controlled water bath provides airline cooks more control; as machines became widely available, several airlines adopt the method.

2011  British Airways and other airline companies enlist the help of popular chefs to redo their First Class menus. Chef Heston Blumenthal appears on a celebrity chef television show on behalf of British Airways.

2012  Japan Airlines serves Kentucky Fried Chicken on a flight during the Christmas season, starting what would become a popular tradition.

2012  British Airways opens a London pop-up restaurant, Flight BA2012, which serves dishes from the airline’s 1948 First Class menu.

2018  In consideration of passengers with peanut-related allergies, Southwest Airlines removes its iconic bag of peanuts from its in-flight snack options.

2019  Singapore Airlines launches its Farm-to-Plane partnership with AeroFarms, an indoor, vertical-farming company based in New Jersey.

_{^{Milestone in the History of In Flight Meals ( https://skift.com/2013/10/11/17-milestones-in-the-history-of-airlines-in-flight-meals/#1 )}}

 
_{^{Food: History of Airline Meals, Erica Berry. ( https://nowheremag.com/2013/02/food-history-of-airline-meals/ )}}

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